Monday, January 2, 2012

“… Christians account for almost a third of the world’s population. This was one of the findings in a report published Monday by the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life. The data from the 2010 survey of more than 200 countries found that worldwide, there are 2.18 billion Christians, nearly a third of the estimated global population at that time of 6.9 billion….

“There are 1.1 billion Catholics worldwide, according to the report. This means they account for half of the global Christian population….

“Catholics are a majority of the population in 67 countries. The Americas accounts for 48% of the global number, with almost 40% in Latin America alone. Europe comes second with 24% of the world’s Catholics, while sub-Saharan Africa makes up 16% and the Asia-Pacific region has 12%.

“The broad definition of Protestants the report uses means they number 801 million worldwide, or 37% of the global Christian population. Protestants form a majority of the total population in 49 countries. …

“The country with the largest number of Protestants is the United States, with about 160 million, making up 20% of the worldwide total. Nigeria comes second, with nearly 60 million Protestants, and China is in third place with approximately 58 million…. [For the whole article click here]